


pela iho la ka nohana `ohana

by wildcosmia



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Community: hc_bingo, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-15
Updated: 2011-06-15
Packaged: 2017-10-20 10:46:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/211955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildcosmia/pseuds/wildcosmia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Family can be both the hurt and the comfort, sometimes.  Danny deals with the aftermath of 1x24, Oia'i'o (spoilers ahead!)  Written for LJ's hc_bingo, round two, prompt: family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	pela iho la ka nohana `ohana

_Fuck_ Steve McGarrett.

Danny’s eight hours into a ten-hour flight he’s supposed to be _enjoying_ , Rachel at his side, Gracie curled up sleeping on at least one of them.

But this is his life post-Steve McGarrett, and nothing’s actually quite so easy anymore.

That flight was three days ago, and it went like this instead: Rachel and Grace got on the plane, without him, because his _partner_ , his own personal _Rambo_ managed to get himself implicated in the murder of the _governor of Hawaii_ at the same damn time. And if that weren’t enough, (of course it wasn’t enough), Kono got her badge and gun taken away. Chin took himself out of the picture. (It doesn’t matter what Chin went and did, Danny still feels betrayed and he’s gonna let it simmer for a few more days.) Jenna went underground and started communicating with Danny via increasingly infuriating text messages, most of which he still doesn’t understand because he doesn’t speak geek talk and Jenna texts exactly like she talks in person, which is to say excitedly, and sometimes the ideas run together when transmitted in short bursts.

Two days ago Rachel called him from a hotel in Newark and issued her final ultimatum. ‘Come to New Jersey, now,’ otherwise he’s officially the _most pathetic, disappointing human being to ever exist anywhere_.

One day ago he was allowed to see Steve, who didn’t say one word during the entire fifteen-minute visit. Danny’s not sure if it was Steve’s paranoia, stubbornness, or what winning out, but he just needed to hear that Steve’s _okay_ , and he couldn’t even get that out of the bastard.

This morning he texted Jenna and told her he was leaving _this_ mess in her surely-capable hands for a couple of days, because it wasn’t the only mess he needed to clean up and if McGarrett won’t talk to him right now then he just got bumped down a notch on Danny’s priority list.

“One more beverage, sir?” asks a cheery flight attendant, gesturing at the beverage cart he hasn’t even noticed move into place next to him. He shakes his head and mumbles a “no, thanks.” She smiles and turns to the opposite row to peddle her goods. Danny’s not thirsty, or hungry, or _anything_ really, except tired. He’s got the address of Rachel’s hotel in his pocket and it feels like it’s burning his skin. He’s spent so much of his time since Steve got arrested trying to figure out how the hell he’s going to get Steve un-arrested that he’s let his other little issue go ignored, but now, less than two hours out of Newark, he thinks he’s starting to panic a little.

\-----

Danny pays the cab fare in cash. The cabbie reacts favorably to the generous tip and parts ways with a friendly “thank you, my brother!” Danny waves distractedly as the cab pulls away from the curb.

He takes a few deep breaths. He’s rehearsed a little of the speech he wants to give Rachel, which basically amounts to, “I want to be with you and Grace and the new baby and do right by you, but I _can’t_ , not right now, not until Lieutenant Commander McHeartAttack is cleared of this thing.” The percentage of that statement that he really believes changes minute to minute. He’d had a moment, a couple months ago, when he considered what he really wanted for himself. Rachel was out of the picture, seemingly forever, and he thought maybe, _maybe_ , he’d been picking up some vibes from Steve, ones that he was open to maybe possibly exploring a little further. But he’s _stupid_ , and McGarrett is _colossally stupid_ , and now he’s not sure what he wants. He does know what he has, though (the result of his being _stupid_ and McGarrett being _colossally stupid_ ), and he at least needs to do right by his women. It’s the only thing that feels even remotely within his power at the moment, and he’s determined to not screw it up any worse than he has, although he’s not sure how going back to Hawaii in—he checks his phone—twenty-one and one-half hours is going to _not_ do just that.

Danny’s a man of optimism, even if he’s right now also a man of _panic_. (He was _dead-on_ earlier. This is definitely panic.)

The elevator chimes, and he’s off on the twelfth floor, staring at the extended suite Stan surely paid for because Stan’s a terribly wet blanket. He knocks, and it’s barely five seconds before the door is flying open and Gracie’s making him drop his bag because she’s jumping all over him. Rachel appears behind her, lips pursed.

Danny swallows and regards her with a smile he hopes looks genuine. She brushes past him to collect his dropped bag, and follows behind him as he enters the suite. He’s maybe going to play this by ear, at first, just to get a better read of where Rachel’s head is currently.

There’s _nothing cowardly_ about that at all.

\-----

Danny eyes the desk clerk with as much suspicion as the desk clerk is eyeing him with. Okay, yeah, it did look (and continues to look) suspicious sitting in the hotel lobby for nine solid hours, and were he in the desk clerk’s position he’d likely be considering him with some reservation like that, too. And really, he’d rather be anyplace else but this stupid hotel lobby. It was just… he wasn’t allowed in Rachel’s suite any longer. And he wasn’t up to facing any of his family, not after this, and Matt… so they were out. He didn’t have enough money to secure his own room here, and quite frankly he wasn’t sure he’d ever wake up in time if left alone in his own hotel room somewhere else.

He only has to wait it out a couple more hours—then he can head back to the airport, eat some sort of sad breakfast, and get back on a plane to the pineapple-infested hellhole that’s looking more and more likely to become his permanent home after this fiasco.

“Are you and your Commander McGarrett fucking?” was the second question out of Rachel’s mouth, after one, she asked how his flight was, and two, she sent Grace off to some hotel kids activity session or whatever nonsense (Danny hadn’t paid much attention to the details, and Gracie hadn’t explained it very well, anyway). The question sounded so _filthy_ coming from her mouth; Danny had immediately cringed in response.

The correct answer was of course ‘no,’ and he said as much, but he was pretty sure Rachel realized the answer tellingly didn’t also include one of ‘it’s not like that,’ ‘we wouldn’t do that,’ ‘Steve’s not like that,’ or ‘I’m not interested like that.’ Rachel had always been able to see through him with shocking (alarming) accuracy.

Danny conceded that her next line of questioning, concerning matters of ‘why did you lead me on then’ and ‘why even start sleeping with me again at all’ and ‘did you never even think about _Grace_ during all of this’ were probably fair, though the last one stung. He’d rambled on about being confused and conflicted, torn about wanting his family back, and most of it wasn’t even bullshit, because he _had_ been conflicted—it was hardly an easy choice, between the genuine thing developing with Steve, even though they were both stupid men (Steve _colossally_ ) and weren’t exactly talking about it or acting on it explicitly yet, and the potential to get his family back with Rachel, his stated goal since moving to Hawaii in the first place.

She had little sympathy for his plight, and he thought that was probably correct, if he was going to be fair about it.

After several hours of this sort of back-and-forth, she just gave up and sent him away. Danny hates that he’s the reason she cried after he went back down the elevator. He never wanted this for any of them. Mercifully, she left him some room to try again—told him, “call, after you save your McGarrett from his own mess” and he knew she meant it, even if she was being a bit snide about Steve. He just didn’t know what he was going to say when (not _if_ ) he reached that point. “Okay, Steve’s okay, he’s no longer public enemy number one, can I move back with you now?”

He’s a complete bastard, worse than Steve.

He’s grown tired of paging through magazines published for people outside of his social class. The _duPont_ registries are just agonizing—sure, he can see the appeal of a four hundred foot yacht, but what’s the point of looking for too long at a pipe dream? It’s not like they give those out to cops as a ‘thank you’ gesture for their public service. He shoves the magazine away and rubs at his face. The desk clerk’s watching him again, so he pulls out his phone as if he’s getting _seriously agitated_ that his imaginary colleague is nowhere to be found yet. He gives it a little angry shake for show.

Interestingly, when he does turn it on, he finds a message from Kono by way of her new super-secret cell number. (There are also seventeen from Jenna, but he just does not have the energy to deal with that right now).

‘jenna says you’ve gone stateside on us. please come back. chin knows you’re mad at him, but he wants to explain. in person.’

Danny grimaces. Kono only sent the message fifteen minutes ago, so he hopes he can still catch her for a little conversation. He ignores the part about Chin (just a little more anger to work through on that front), instead opting to ask how she’s holding up.

‘keeping a low profile. introducing jenna to some island contacts.’

He smiles at that. He really admires Kono’s relentlessness in the face of everything that’s gone down, and he of course approves whole-heartedly with introducing Jenna around to her network of trusted island contacts. Help of all kinds is going to be crucial to untangling Steve’s disaster, and Kono’s, and if she trusts someone enough to introduce Jenna, then he’s all for it. He tells her as much, and inquires again as to how she’s doing _personally_. She’s starting to dodge questions like a pro.

‘gotta keep moving, you know how it is. brah, we really miss you. come back soon, we need you to work your magic.’

The ego stroking is always welcome, especially tonight, but he takes what Kono’s saying between the lines to heart even more. He mentally replaces ‘we’ with ‘I’ because he and Chin aren’t exactly on terms right now, and who else is there? (It’s still unclear to him what Jenna thinks about him; the barrage of texts to his phone doesn’t mean much more to him than she’s furiously working to get Steve cleared and she knows he needs to play a big role in that.) He’s come to think of Kono as another one of his little sisters; he thinks he’s mostly gotten over the urge to check her out when she’s wearing something particularly sexy and/or skimpy, which is probably for the best. He misses her, too. She’s young, but she’d surely have some sage advice for him on his home front, since she seems to know _way more_ than she should about pretty much everything.

He fires off a reply to tell her he’s on his way back shortly, actually, and to keep her head up in the meantime.

‘you too. don’t forget i’ve got your back too, danny, on everything. talk more when i see you. (soon!)’

He fights the urge to save that message like it’s some flirtatious treasure to a love struck teenager. He _is_ , though, long past the point where it’s beyond him to admit that he needs to hear that, from at least one person in his life. Rachel doesn’t have his back, not that he should expect her to after he’s messed up so much. (Gracie has his back, he hopes, but it’d be manipulative of him to actually ask her as much so that’s obviously out.) Chin may or may not have his back again, though he’s not sure if he’s ready to go there just yet. Steve probably has his back, but it’d be a hell of a lot easier if he’d just _open his damn mouth_ so he’d know where they stand on any of their myriad issues. He’s got Kono, though, and that really does count for something—in fact, it counts for a lot.

\-----

Danny’s in the air again; apparently the plane’s over some place allegedly called “Sioux City, Iowa” right now, a fact helpfully announced to the cabin by the co-captain. His return flight had a quick layover in Detroit, which was only useful to him because it gave him a chance to buy something obscenely fatty and sugary. He’s situated in row 18, seat A (and thank God and all that’s holy for that; if he didn’t have a window seat the flight probably wouldn’t end before he got into a fight) and happily working on consuming an entire box of glazed donuts. The passenger in seat B had given him a curious glance as he started the fifth donut from the twelve-pack; his only response was to smack his lips and continue eating. There’s a good chance he’s going to stress off all of these calories once he’s back in Honolulu anyway, so for the moment the mini-Steve that’s recently taken to perching on his shoulder to bitch about how his choice of dinner/snack/breakfast/beverage/everything is _appalling_ has been ignored.

He received a short text from Rachel just as the flight crew began their militant scolding of people for not having their phones turned off yet that gave him some hope for not having completely destroyed his family, not yet anyway.

‘Be careful.’

And he’s spent some more time thinking, after his brief conversation with Kono. (Time’s certainly been on his side, too, between the hotel lobby, the cab ride, the airport, and the first flight to Detroit.) He’s decided he’s mostly useless to himself until he figures out what he really wants—and he realizes that finally admitting he’d never really _honestly_ done that is a big first step in the right direction.

The beverage cart’s back, with a different cheery flight attendant offering up peanuts, pretzels, or cookies this time as well (Delta’s treat, apparently). He orders a regular Coke _and_ the cookies, because he’s fully committed to this death factory of a snack. She serves it to him with a little extra wink, and he’s amazed that anyone’s got it in them to flirt with him at this point—his hair’s about fourteen hours past its expiration date and he doesn’t want to think just yet about how much sleep it’s going to take to rid his eyes of the bags he can feel almost bursting off his face.

Seat B gives him a rather stern look of disapproval for also selecting the cookies, and it takes all of Danny’s finely developed professional patience to refrain from saying something that would surely attract the attention of their friendly air marshal (he doesn’t normally see air marshals on his flights, but he picked out one on this flight within a minute; the guy practically screamed ‘I’m a COP’ in every move he made during boarding.)

Donut ten proves to be Danny’s limit, half an hour after he got his Coke from the flirty flight attendant. He shoves the nearly empty box under the seat in front of him, intending to finish it before the end of the flight—he just can’t take any more right now, because his stomach has (finally) started threatening mutiny. He shoves the window shade down and tilts his seat back. At this point, the sun just pisses him off.

He’s decided to utilize Kono for more than just get-Steve-out-of-prison assistance once he’s back on the island. It’s not his usual play, but even he can admit how far gone his personal life is and how much is really at stake. Sure, he’ll probably get a beer or four deep before he plows ahead with the advice seeking, as a shallow way to give him some manly cover. She’ll see right through it, too, because she’s _smart_ , but she won’t call him on it. She’ll just remind him, ‘ _ohana_ , brah,’ and listen, because she’s _amazing_ like that….

‘don’t forget i’ve got your back too, danny, on everything.’

He’ll probably need Kono to cunningly butter Steve up for a bit before he tries anything anyway, because talking to Steve McGarrett about personal matters on terms other than Steve’s own is generally considered an exercise in futility on a _good day_. Danny really must be stupid, to think that he’s going to get Steve to talk about personal lives, his, Danny’s, _theirs_ , considering everything else, but Kono’s pretty sneaky (it’s scary, really), and Danny’s sure she’ll be excited to have a distraction from the more serious matters facing her right now. He’s out of options, and he hopes that Steve will understand. (The fact that he’s actually _counting_ on that sort of underscores the desperation he’s found himself in; there’s no way sane, emotionally sound, appropriately slumbered Danny actually counts on that, no way.)

He still can’t help but be frustrated by the _colossally stupid_ partner he’s chosen for himself, though (that’s right, _chosen_ , because Danny’s still an autonomous person damn it, despite what McGarrett might stubbornly imply to the contrary). It’s amazing to think that his divorce from Rachel is looking positively _easy_ compared to the mess he’s in now.

And for that, _fuck_ Steve McGarrett, honestly.


End file.
